A Story - "Garden Space" - and Dog-tooth Violets, Daffodils, Hyacinth, Windflower, Species Tulip, Blue Cohosh

 A Story

Garden Space

A chickadee plucked a ripe seed from the sunflower head that Jill had placed on her porch railing.  In a basket, crimson tomatoes were snug with butter-yellow beans, multi-coloured carrots, burgundy cabbages. A bouquet of pink, purple, magenta asters adorned the patio table.

Jill's husband had died the previous spring.  Rather than send her a short-lived arrangement for the funeral, one neighbour had offered Jill space in a garden.

It became a place to dig through her grief.  Growing flowers and vegetables connected her to life.  Beauty grew peace and happiness.  Hope and purpose started to return.

The dog-tooth violets grow wild in our Eastern Ontario hardwood bush.  They are fussy as to location and when I tried to transplant one or two, they didn't take.

They often grow near the base of a large tree like this patch, but they will also grow and flower in other spots as well. Like all native spring bulbs, they like the spring sun and summer shade so a hardwood forest is perfect for them.

A pretty double daffodil.  I really like these ones and they have a strong sweet scent.  They are vigorous and every few years can be divided . 

These little cuties are fun .  Not quite as small as some miniature daffodils, but the flowers are only a couple of inches across.

I haven't planted hyacinths in a long time as they don't tend to come back the following years. These ones are pretty though and they are planted near the lemon yellow daffodils making a pleasant combination.

There seems to be a yellow theme to this collection of photographs.   Even in this picture of the purple windflowers, there is green and yellow euonymus in the foreground.

The little species tulips which grow to about 6" high are becoming a favourite of mine.  Every year the clump gets bigger but in a well-behaved way.

This almost black plant is blue cohosh which is also native to our bush. The brownish flowers are hard to notice but they also have a touch of yellow at the center.  Later the leaves of the plant will turn green and it will produce poisonous round blue berries.

I watched a fascinating video on Youtube by Leslie the Bird Nerd about chickadees nesting in a box. She has a camera in the box so the viewer can see the whole process of nest building all the way through to babies fledging. Very well done video. Some fun antics between the mom and dad bird.